Why you should FIFA 15

Fancy yourself to be a better tactician than Jose Mourinho? Try this

Another year, another virtual game to give you your football fix until the next one.

Yes, FIFA 15 betters its predecessors in terms of gameplay, trademark player traits and style and – to an extent – graphics, but that’s something you’d expect from an annual game franchise. Here’s why FIFA 15 is worth your money and the 50+ hours you’ll spend playing it.

Become the “Special One”
FIFA’s now letting you step into the shoes of the likes of Jose Mourinho and Pep Guardiola with their new tactical setup. The menus make navigating through team tactics and roles far easier but for the first time you can decide if you want your team to “Park The Bus” (bring all 11 players behind the ball and defend until the final whistle) or go “All Out Attack”. Teammates now gesture where they want the ball to be played giving us less headaches to go ahead with a defence splitting pass.

You need to take your chances
Yaya Sanogo, Marouane Chamakh and Fernando Torres are a few wasteful strikers you’ll want to leave out of your starting XI. In FIFA 15, defenders seem hell-bent on blocking every ball. Let’s say you manage to get past them with some sublime piece of play or outrageous skill, you should count yourself lucky if the ball goes past the improved goalkeeper AI. Keepers are tough to get past this season and worse still, unlike last year’s edition, a headed goal hack doesn’t exist.

The atmosphere
This year, publishers Electronic Arts (EA) have finally made in-game spectators look lifelike, as opposed to the cardboard cutouts from years past. Taking that a step further, in-game supporters now sing their club anthems and even jeer them when trailing a game or after a pitiful performance. The commentary is not great but is certainly an upgrade over the recycled lines we’ve been listening to for the last two years. The best part though – EA have added actual stadiums to the game this year which means no more generic football pitches. There isn’t much a football purist could complain about.